Talking Points

03 December 2012

“What [Obama] proposed this week was a classic bait and switch on the American people—a tax increase double the size of what he campaigned on, billions of dollars in new stimulus spending and an unlimited, unchecked authority to borrow from the Chinese.

Maybe I missed it but I don’t recall him asking for any of that during the presidential campaign. These ideas are so radical that they have already been rejected on a bipartisan basis by Congress.”

Watch:

As is the absolute normal in these times, if it’s a Republican talking, it spews pure nonsense. Think Progress notes, emphasis mine:

Obama’s proposal — which includes $1.6 trillion in increased taxes on the rich over the next decade, $400 billion in savings in Medicare and other social programs, $50 billion in stimulus spending to begin next year, and an end to current debt ceiling rules — is not new or radical: it reflects the very same same policies Obama advanced for years and promoted extensively on the campaign trail.

Republicans are feigning shock that Obama is proposing to implement the very same policies that Americans voted for in November, as they seek to define his second term agenda and bolster their own negotiating position. Meanwhile, they have yet to offer their own detailed proposal to avert the cliff.

21 October 2012

“You guys are the ones who keep saying, ‘Oh, he's not approachable’.That's not what the American people say. I think maybe you guys should evaluate where you're coming from. Maybe it's you. Maybe it's the elite journalists who aren't all that approachable.”

17 October 2012

The National Federation of Independent Businesses is the same group (the plaintiff in the lawsuit heard by SCOTUS) that took their campaign to strike down Obamacare to the Supreme Court. As Ashby noted, “it’s highly unlikely Romney was speaking to anyone who agrees with President Obama [in this group]”.

During a conference call with the NFIB, Mitt Romney suggested to these employers that they should tell their employees how to vote:

“I hope you make it very clear to your employees what you believe is in the best interest of your enterprise and therefore their job and their future in the upcoming elections. And whether you agree with me or you agree with President Obama, or whatever your political view, I hope you pass those along to your employees. Nothing illegal about you talking to your employees about what you believe is best for the business. Because I think that will figure in to their election decision. Their voting decision.”

Huffington Post notes that the NFIB employers will not be the only businesses “encouraging” their employees to vote Republican:

Westgate Resorts CEO David Siegel gained national attention when he emailed his employees to argue that Obama's policies would "threaten" their jobs.

"If any new taxes are levied on me, or my company, as our current President plans, I will have no choice but to reduce the size of this company," Siegel wrote, urging his workers to instead vote for Romney.

Arthur Allen, CEO of ASG Software Solutions, made a similar plea in a pro-Romney email leaked last week.

"If we fail as a nation to make the right choice on November 6th, and we lose our independence as a company, I don’t want to hear any complaints regarding the fallout that will most likely come." Allen wrote.

And Think Progress has a report on the Koch brothers attempt to influence the vote in this election cycle by sending a letter to 45,000 employees, warning them of “consequences” for the workers if Romney loses:

The Koch brothers’ $60 million pledge to defeat President Obama — along with their political network’s $400 million spending — make them two of the most influential conservatives this election.

Not content with their unprecedented influence in politics, the Kochs have also taken to influencing the votes of their employees. According to In These Times, Koch Industries sent 45,000 mailers to employees at Koch subsidiary Georgia Pacific, urging votes for Romney and other conservative candidates. The letter warns ominously of “consequences” for the workers if Republicans lose.

The Koch mailer is one of several recent examples of executives warning that employees may lose their jobs if Republicans do not win in November.

Yes, sadly, this is legal. The only thing we can do is vote these thugs down, and let people know just what they’re doing in order to win elections.

13 October 2012

A Romney administration would be likely to categorize Americans into two groups—the “makers” and the “takers” (based on writings by Ayn Rand, Ryan’s muse). Indeed, Mitt Romney has already done so in his own mind, and verbalized his disdain for the “takers” in his 47% comments made to his fellow plutocrats in Florida. This flowchart by Mother Jones will help you determine into which category you would fall Lots of luck!.

Included in this latest ad from Obama-Biden, is a small portion of Mitt Romney’s interview with 60 Minutes’ Scott Pelley, focused on Romney’s idea of tax fairness (broadcast on Sunday, September 23, 2012). Watch:

20 September 2012

Thanks to a leaked video, we know that Mitt Romney divides the country into those who pay taxes and those who don't, the makers and the moochers.

There is one perhaps surprising group you can put in the latter category: the nation's banks. Sure, banks pay taxes, but they pay a lot less thanks to a giant and underappreciated distortion in our nation's tax code. Moreover, this tax code distortion makes the financial system and the economy more fragile, prone to bankruptcies and runs. Banks profit, and the economy teeters. Great bargain, huh?

31 August 2012

Conservative Independent Andrew Sullivan was brief and to the point about the lies spewed by Lying Liar Paul Ryan during his convention speech Wednesday night, formatting and emphasis mine:

“Claim: We will protect Medicare!Truth: Ryan banks more savings from Medicare than Obama does and throws out all the cost control experiments that might - just might - bend the cost curve downward.

Claim:We will balance the budget!Truth:by slashing taxes and revenues and by boosting defense, they won't, by their own accounting, for another two decades. If we really cannot wait, how do two decades of more debt accumulation help?

Claim: we protected the auto industry.Truth: they wanted Detroit to go bankrupt.

Claim:the only thing the stimulus did was add debt.Truth:yes it added debt, but it did so in large part by tax cuts that Ryan approves of.

And so you have an alternative empirical universe in which a deeply radical platform that would transform Medicare for the young, while retaining it in full for the biggest generation, and increase the debt for two more decades, is portrayed as a multicultural rescue of Medicare and the economy.”

19 August 2012

Watch:

So, you heard Mitt Romney say: “for people 55 years of age and older, there’s no change.” You won’t like the translation.

Under the Romney-Ryan plan for Medicare, if you are younger than age 55, let’s say 54, and Romney-Ryan are elected to office, you will see a Medicare that is completely different from the one that your parents and grandparents enjoyed. It will be a voucherized plan, entailing fewer benefits and much higher costs to the beneficiaries.

In the first decade, the big things are (i) conversion of Medicaid into a block grant program, with much lower funding than projected under current law and (ii) sharp cuts in top tax rates and corporate taxes.

Is this a deficit-reduction program? Not on the face of it: it’s basically a tradeoff of reduced aid to the poor for reduced taxes on the rich, with the net effect of the specific proposals being to increase, not reduce, the deficit.

Watch and listen to President Obama knock down the Medicare lies of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan:

“Now, you know the truth is I think they know it’s not a very popular idea. Now they are being dishonest about my plans, since they can’t sell their plans. I mean they are trying to throw everything at the wall just to see what will stick. The latest thing they’ve been trying is to talk about Medicare. Now, you’d think they’d avoid talking about Medicare given the fact that both of them have proposed to voucherize the Medicare system. But I guess they figure the best defense is to try to go on offense.

So New Hampshire, here is what you need to know. Since I’ve been in office, I have strengthened Medicare. I’ve made reforms that have extended the life of the program, that have saved millions of seniors with Medicare hundreds of dollars on prescription drugs. The only changes to your benefits that I’ve made on Medicare is that Medicare now covers new preventive services like cancer screening and wellness visits for free.

Gov. Romney and Congressman Ryan have a very different plan. What they want to do is that they want seniors to get a voucher to buy their own insurance, which could force seniors to pay an extra $6,400 a year for their healthcare. Again, this is not my estimate. Remember those guys who analyze these things for a living? That’s their assessment. That doesn’t strengthen Medicare. That undoes the very guarantee of Medicare. That’s the core of the plan written by Congressman Ryan and endorsed by Gov. Romney.

So here’s the bottom line. My plan saves money in Medicare by cracking down on fraud, and waste and insurance company subsidies, and their plan makes seniors pay more so they can give another tax cut to millionaires and billionaires. My plan’s already extended the life of Medicare by nearly a decade. Their plan would put Medicare on track to be ended as we know it. It would be an entirely different plan. A plan in which you could not count on healthcare because it would have to be coming out of your pocket. That’s the real difference between our plans on Medicare.”

13 August 2012

Former adviser to Bill Clinton, Paul Begala on what he calls the “plutocrat ticket”, or Romney-Ryan 2012, emphasis mine:

“In selecting Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney has doubled-down on the one thing he has never flip-flopped on: economic elitism. Romney, born to wealth, has selected Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan, who was also born to wealth. As the former University of Oklahoma football coach, Barry Switzer, once said of someone else: both these guys were born on third and thought they hit a triple.

There's nothing wrong with inherited wealth. Lord knows great presidents from FDR to JFK came into their fortunes through the luck of birth. But there is something wrong with winners of the lineage lottery who want to hammer those who did not have the foresight to select wealthy sperm and egg.

Finally, we have peered into Mitt Romney's core. It is neither pro-choice nor pro-life; neither pro-NRA nor pro-gun control; neither pro-equality nor antigay. But it is pro-wealth and very anti–middle class. Mitt Romney has decided to go nuclear in the class war.”

The image is from Chris Hayes, and I think this pretty much puts the lie to the notion that Paul Ryan is a Very Serious Deficit Hawk.

As can be seen from his voting record, Paul Ryan was unconcerned about the deficit when voting for Bush era policies, and in fact, Ryan continued to vote for the extension of the Bush era tax cuts for the wealthy even after Obama took office.

10 August 2012

You may have seen the ad already. It consists of a false premise which relies on a racist dogwhistle to create an effective, anti-Obama ad; in other words, it was another Big Fat Lie by the Big Fat Liar Mitt Romney.

A Big Fat Lie that former President Bill Clinton swiftly struck down when he released a statement completely repudiating the allegations in the Romney ad, emphasis mine:

“Governor Romney released an ad today alleging that the Obama administration had weakened the work requirements of the 1996 Welfare Reform Act. That is not true.

The act emerged after years of experiments at the state level, including my work as Governor of Arkansas beginning in 1980. When I became President, I granted waivers from the old law to 44 states to implement welfare to work strategies before welfare reform passed.

After the law was enacted, every state was required to design a plan to move people into the workforce, along with more funds to help pay for training, childcare and transportation. As a result, millions of people moved from welfare to work.

The recently announced waiver policy was originally requested by the Republican governors of Utah and Nevada to achieve more flexibility in designing programs more likely to work in this challenging environment. The Administration has taken important steps to ensure that the work requirement is retained and that waivers will be granted only if a state can demonstrate that more people will be moved into work under its new approach. The welfare time limits, another important feature of the 1996 act, will not be waived.

The Romney ad is especially disappointing because, as governor of Massachusetts, he requested changes in the welfare reform laws that could have eliminated time limits altogether. We need a bipartisan consensus to continue to help people move from welfare to work even during these hard times, not more misleading campaign ads.”

“I’m not a business. We have a process in this country, which was established by law, which provides for the transparency, which candidates are required to meet. I have met with that requirement with full financial disclosure of all my investments, but in addition have provided and will provide a full two years of tax returns.”

“I’m not a business”? Huh?

First of all, and please correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t Mr. Romney making a HUGE BIG FRICKIN’ DEAL out of his ‘business acumen’? Seriously. So let’s see your damn financials, Mr. Romney!

Second, Romney has thus far only released ONE tax return, that of 2010; evidently he needs more time to prettify his 2011 return.

Third, Romney’s Dad, and every presidential candidate since then, has released TWELVE frickin’ years of tax returns! Why should Romney be any different, why should he be excused from revealing what the taxpayer has a right to know?

Fourth, if he really paid zero in income taxes for ten years (and that’s way more possible than you think), he should not even have considered running for the presidency. I mean, where is his sense of fairness and patriotism if he can’t even grudgingly pay a very small percentage of his huge income in taxes? It’s un-American!

08 August 2012

At a fundraiser in Connecticut, President Obama coined a catchy, very apt new name for Romney’s tax plan:

“It's like Robin Hood in reverse – it's Romney Hood!”

The president went on to explain:

“The entire centerpiece of Mitt Romney’s economic plan is a new $5 trillion tax cut. Governor Romney’s plan would effectively raise taxes on middle-class families with children by an average of $2,000 to pay for this tax cut, not to reduce the deficit, not to invest in things that grow our economy. … He’d ask the middle class to pay more taxes so that he could give another $250,000 tax cut to people making more than $3 million a year.”

UPDATE: According to ABC News, the term “Romney Hood” was actually coined by Priorities USA, a liberal super pac:

The term, which drew the loudest applause and triggered a flood of buzz online, was coined not by Obama or his speechwriters but by a team of Democratic strategists working for Priorities USA Action, which floated the concept last week.

While Priorities USA Action and the Obama campaign are forbidden by law from formally collaborating, they have been known to take subtle cues from each other on message and tactics….

03 August 2012

“The people of America recognize that the slowdown in jobs that occurred during the early years of the Bush administration were the result of a perfect storm. And an effort by one candidate to somehow say "Oh, this recession and the slowdown in jobs was the result of somehow this president magically being elected..." people in America just dismiss that as being poppycock. And they recognize it as that.”

24 July 2012

Oh dear. Another Republican has apparently fallen in to the trap whereby he (mind bogglingly stupid) admits that voter id is about helping Romney win, and not, you know, about actual voter fraud (which doesn’t really exist in in-person voting).

KEYES: If it were upheld and in place in time for the November election, do you think — polls have shown a pretty razor-thin margin — do you think it might ultimately help Romney’s campaign here in the state? GROTHMAN: Yes. Right. I think we believe that insofar as there are inappropriate things, people who vote inappropriately are more likely to vote Democrat. KEYES: So if these protections are in place of voter ID, that might ultimately help him in a close race? GROTHMAN: Right. I think if people cheat, we believe the people who cheat are more likely to vote against us.

While the Wisconsin law has been by permanently blocked by Circuit Judge David Flanagan, the ruling is likely to be appealed, and if it is in fact reinstated, the law may very well allow a Romney win unfairly (and by absolute intention of the Republicans), disenfranchising at least 300,000 people in Wisconsin:

Wisconsin is perennially a swing state in presidential elections. Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) carried Wisconsin by just 0.4 percent in 2004; polls this year suggest it could be another nailbiter. PPP gives President Obama a 6-point edge, 50-44, but Rasmussen put Romney ahead by 3 points, 47-44.

Approximately 300,000 Wisconsinites lack a government-issued photo ID, more than 27 times the margin that Kerry won by in 2004. If the polls are still close in November and voter ID is reinstated, Grothman may very well be correct that the new law will give Romney an edge on Election Day. [….]

[….] A spokeswoman for Wisconsin’s Department of Justice, which defended the law in court, said state lawyers are currently reviewing Flanagan’s decision but will likely appeal the ruling.

05 July 2012

“(1) Why did you park so much of your money outside the United States? (2) Did you create a Bermuda-based corporation to avoid U.S. taxes? and (3) when can Americans see the decades' worth of tax returns you turned over to John McCain in 2008?”

The Obama campaign is calling for Mitt Romney to place his money in a blind trust to avoid any appearance of conflict, via MSNBC, emphasis mine:

The Obama campaign warned Thursday that Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney will have full access to those three pots of money unless he puts his investments in a federally-recognized blind trust.

Seizing on the Romney campaign’s announcement Wednesday that the candidate would only turn his holdings over to a federal trust if and when he becomes president, the Obama campaign claimed that Romney’s decision not to do so sooner underscores the point they’ve been trying to make about him: He’s wealthy, which makes him out of touch, and sometimes evasive about his wealth, which makes him untrustworthy.

Because Romney’s current blind trust isn’t recognized by federal standards, under which trusts are overseen by the Office of Government Ethics, it isn’t really “blind” because Romney’s personal attorney, with whom Romney can easily communicate, oversees it, Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt asserted today during a conference call with reporters.

(Politicians will place their personal assets in blind trusts to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest when they direct government funds to the private sector.)

“Romney has claimed that his investments were in a blind trust which was managed by his personal attorney. This gave him the appearance of keeping his investments at arms’ length. It’s also how he denied responsibility for investments in a Swiss bank account, Chinese companies, companies that do business with Iran and tax havens in Bermuda and the Cayman Islands,” LaBolt said.

The Associated Press reported Wednesday that Romney’s attorney R. Bradford Malt sold off stock in the Chinese companies and others that traded with Iran beginning in 2010 as the presidential election neared.

Romney’s lack of transparency over the trust raises other questions about his wider financial dealings, such as how close he remains to Bain Capital, Obama counsel Robert Bauer said on the call. Last week, Romney disclosed more than $2 million in new income from Bain, which he has not led in nearly a decade.

“Could it be that he’s still providing services in some sense even though he said he ceased providing services to Bain in 1999?“ Bauer asked.

Romney still hasn’t produced his tax returns, and it’s doubtful that he’ll be willing to give up that much control over his money prior to the election, given his inclination to control freakiness.

24 May 2012

Professional baseball player Jose Canseco on Mitt Romney’s idiotic remark about how President Obama hasn’t ‘fixed’ the deficit:

“Romney. This joker comes in saying that Obama has done nothing: ‘He hasn't fixed the deficit.’ Let me tell you something. Do you actually fucking believe that in four years you're going to fix the deficit? Are you kidding me? That's a lifetime project. ... It's amazing the bullshit that people believe.”

It should be noted by anyone with half a brain that no president “fixes” or has ever “fixed” the deficit. It should also be noted that President Obama, unlike his predecessors in the Republican Party , has reduced the deficit that they ran up by $312 billion. Fact.

“Those of us who believe in free markets and those of us who believe that, in fact, the whole goals of investment is entrepreneurship and job creation, would find it pretty hard to justify rich people figuring out clever, legal ways to loot out a company.”

Hell, there are plenty of hypocrites to go around when it comes to the Bain Capital controversy, but President Obama isn’t one of those hypocrites.

“ [.....] this is of a piece with the swift boating of the President being undertaken by outside groups, who are attacking Obama for using the death of Osama bin Laden as a demonstration of his foreign policy successes and abilities. Gregory, quoting the ever-reliable New York Post, asked Biden, "Was all of this together in effect his 'Mission Accomplished' moment?" Again, Biden could have grabbed Gregory by his tie and gritted his teeth in that Biden way and said, "Listen, motherfucker. Here's the difference: we actually accomplished the mission." But, alas, he did not.

You can be assured that if bin Laden was still free, Republicans would have been running nonstop ads about how Obama hadn't captured him and how bin Laden was plotting right now to shoot down your airplanes and make your women wear burqas. But that strategy is out the window, so all they can do is go with this bullshit "spiking the ball" thing.

Hey, you know who else spiked the ball? Ike. Yep, in his reelection campaign in 1956, President Eisenhower used his ending the Korean War as a reason to vote for him. That ad asked, among other things, "Can we dismiss the man who has kept us at peace, and take a chance on a man untried and inexperienced in international negotiations and world problems? What do you say? Are you willing to bet everything you love and hold dear that [Adlai] Stevenson can also keep us out of war? Are you that sure of it?" How is that Republican strategy any different than Obama asking what Romney would have done?”

06 May 2012

Watch a fired up President Obama in Ohio for the first 2012 campaign rally and/or read the full text transcript below:

FULL TEXT TRANSCRIPT President Obama Remarks in Columbus, Ohio, May 5, 2012

PRESIDENT OBAMA: I want to thank so many of our Neighborhood Team Leaders for being here today. You guys will be the backbone of this campaign. And I want the rest of you to join a team or become a leader yourself, because we are going to win this thing the old-fashioned way -- door by door, block by block, neighborhood by neighborhood.

Ohio, four years ago, you and I began a journey together.

I didn’t run, and you didn’t work your hearts out, just to win an election. We came together to reclaim the basic bargain that built the largest middle class and the most prosperous nation on Earth.

Romney’s been running around babbling that unemployment should be at 4%, something that is just not gonna happen until we raise taxes on the rich. Former Secretary of Labor under Clinton, Robert Reich, responds on Twitter:

“Rom says unemp shld be 4%. I was Sec of Lab last time it was 4%. We got there by raising taxes on rich and investing in ed and infrstructre.”

02 May 2012

Mitt and Ann Romney have invested their money all over the world, but none of these off-shore accounts were disclosed on their 2010 tax returns, the only returns they’ve released to this point.

The locations of the Romney off-shore investments (also see the diagram below):

BERMUDA: The Ann D. Romney Blind Trust held an interest in a Bermudan company. The value was not disclosed in tax returns.

CAYMAN ISLANDS: The Ann D. Romney Blind Trust held interests in numerous investment partnerships. The value was not disclosed in tax returns

IRELAND: The Ann D. Romney Blind Trust held an interest in Goldman Sachs Liquid Reserves Fund and others. The value was not disclosed in tax returns

LUXEMBOURG: The Romney Family Trust held interests in Bain Capital and other funds. The value was not disclosed in tax returns.

GERMANY: The Romney Family Trust held interests in a German private equity company . The value was not disclosed in tax returns.

AUSTRALIA: The Romney Family Trust held interests in a property management company. The value was not disclosed in tax returns.

SWITZERLAND: The Romneys’ Swiss bank account, with a value of approximately $3 million. The value was not disclosed in tax returns.

In February, Mitt Romney amended his financial disclosure forms to include the off-shore investments pictured above, and income from a Swiss bank account that he had not previously reported, and which was not disclosed on 2010 tax returns. It was worth approximately $3 million at the time of disclosure. What else is Mr. Romney hiding?

Tell Mitt and Ann Romney to release more tax returns. 2010 isn’t enough. We know nothing about their finances during the years in which he headed up venture vulture firm, Bain Capital.

In contrast, President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama (along with the Bidens) released 11 tax returns, all of which may be seen here.

30 April 2012

Mitt Romney tells young people to borrow money from their parents to get a college education or start a business, because, you know, only those who have parents with the means deserve to get a hand up:

“This kind of divisiveness, this attack of success, is very different than what we’ve seen in our country’s history. We’ve always encouraged young people: Take a shot, go for it, take a risk, get the education, borrow money if you have to from your parents, start a business.”

Mr. Silver Spoon Romney doesn’t seem to understand that in these days of raging income inequality, most parents don’t have the money to provide a college education for their kids. And, most parents can’t afford to loan their kids money to start a business. They spend most of it simply surviving.

But, Mr. Romney doesn’t get those simple basic facts because Mitt Romney has never had to struggle financially for a single day in his entire life.

President Obama gets it. He and First Lady Michelle Obama did not grow up with the proverbial silver spoon, and had to see to their own educations by taking advantage of student loans and scholarships:

“I'm only here today, and Michelle is only where she is today, because scholarships and student loans gave us a shot at a great education. That’s how we succeeded.”

“[.....]We’ve got to make college more affordable for more young people. We can’t put the middle class at a disadvantage. We can’t price out folks who are trying to make sure that they not only succeed for themselves but help the country succeed. We can’t price the middle class out of a college education.We can’t do it -- especially when most new jobs in America will require more than a high school diploma. Higher education whether it’s at a four-year institution or a two-year program at a community college -- it can’t be a luxury. It’s an economic imperative every family in America should be able to afford.”

UPDATE: A new program instituted under President Obama is a huge, huge, huge boon to people who use student loans to get through college. You can check it out here.

“But there's no question that over the past several weeks, that a discussion about religious liberty was distorted into a discussion about contraceptives. And there was the somehow Republicans are opposed to contraceptives. I think it was most unfortunate twist by our Democrat friends. I think this will pass as an issue as people understand our real position.”

There has been no misunderstanding by Democrats of Republican positions on women’s concerns, Mr. Romney.

The Washington Post digs into the latest USA Today-Gallup poll of a dozen battleground states and notes that "among independent women -- a key group of swing voters -- Obama had been trailing Romney by five points in a series of surveys late last year. But that number shifted dramatically in polling conducted in February and March, and the president took a 14-point lead over the former Massachusetts governor, marking a net gain of 19 points."

When Reince Priebus, the Chairman of the Republican National Committee feels free to publicly make a remark such as this one, it becomes crystal clear exactly how Republicans feel about women.

03 April 2012

Yesterday, at a news conference with the leaders of Canada and Mexico, President Obama expressed confidence that the Supreme Court will uphold the healthcare law:

“Ultimately, I am confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress.”

In addition, President Obama pointed out that in accordance with precedent, the ACA mandate is constitutional.

The president then issued what some may consider a warning (and damn it, good for him, because the Conservative members of the Court obviously need to be reminded of what their job actually is!) to the Court (or a forerunner of a major campaign talking point if SCOTUS overturns the ACA):

“And I'd just remind conservative commentators that, for years, what we have heard is, the biggest problem on the bench was judicial activism, or a lack of judicial restraint, that an unelected group of people would somehow overturn a duly constituted and passed law.

Well, this is a good example, and I'm pretty confident that this court will recognize that and not take that step.”

And, with predictable timing, the right wing has now begun making these comments into a BFD, as in, you know, “How dare this [black man] president challenge our Supreme Court? They are non-partisan. Even if the five Conservative members of the court consistently rule in accordance with GOP wishes. So what? Obama and the left must be stopped!”

Robert Parry on the Conservative justices, in an enlightening article on “a judicial war on democracy”:

These five Republican justices – John Roberts, Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, Anthony Kennedy and Samuel Alito – appear poised to effectively rewrite the Constitution’s Commerce Clause in order to justify thwarting the judgment of elected officials who enacted the Affordable Care Act in 2010.

If the GOP Five continue on this presumed course toward striking down “Obamacare,” it also would become the latest front in what looks to be a right-wing judicial war on democracy – with the Supreme Court’s Republicans serving not as fair-minded arbiters of the Constitution but as a black-robed rear-guard of an ideological army.

This brouhaha just began, and my educated guess is that it will continue to grow. It may even become a central tenet of the Obama re-election campaign; after all, this court has made three very partisan decisions in recent years, beginning with Bush v. Gore in 2000. And this, they are charged by our Constitution, not to do.

Senior campaign adviser to President Obama, David Axelrod took some very keen shots at GOP frontrunner, Mitt Romney, on CBS this morning:

“I think he must watch Mad Men and think it's the evening news. He's just in a time warp.

You have a guy who wants to go back to the same policies that got us into this disaster. He wants to cut taxes for the very wealthy, cut Wall Street loose to write its own rules and he thinks that this somehow is going to produce broad prosperity for Americans. We've tested that. It's failed.”

The Senate on Thursday thwarted Democratic plans to strip billions of dollars in tax breaks from the largest oil companies, just an hour or so after President Obama urged the chamber to kill off the deductions.

Today, we found out that the 47 senators who voted against the bill have received almost $24 million in contributions from oil and gas. The 51 senators who voted to repeal the big oil subsidies received only $5+ million.

In a 51-47 vote, 43 Senate Republicans and four Democrats filibustered to protect $24 billion in tax breaks for Big Oil. Although a majority voted for Sen. Robert Menendez’s (D-NJ) bill, it fell short of the 60 needed. The only two Republicans to break rank were Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) and retiring Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME).

A Think Progress Green analysis shows how oil and gas companies have funneled cash to the same senators who protected its handouts:

– The 47 senators voting against the bill have received $23,582,500 in career contributions from oil and gas. The 51 senators voting to repeal oil tax breaks have received $5,873,600.

– The senators who voted for Big Oil’s handouts received on average over four times as much career oil cash as those who voted to end them.

– Overall, Senate Republicans have taken $23.2 million in oil and gas contributions. Democrats received $6.66 million.

– Since 2011, Senate Republicans have voted seven times for pro-Big Oil interests and against clean energy three times.

Republicans have taken an overwhelming 88 percent of oil and gas contributions this election cycle. While showering politicans with cash, the oil industry also spent over $146,000,000 on lobbying last year.

Although 55 percent of Americans want to see Big Oil welfare end, the GOP once again largely acted in-line with their Big Oil donors.

For a full list of names and dollar amounts of oil and gas contributions to the Senate, visit Think Progress.

29 March 2012

Even though it is well known and understood by all and sundry who pay attention to politics that should the Supreme Court strike down the Affordable Care Act, they would be ignoring, blatantly ignoring, the Constitution, and almost 200 years of precedent.

Let’s be clear here--that act alone would make these right wing justices activist judges if they weren’t already activist judges given their Citizens United ruling in 2010, and for some, the Bush v. Gore ruling in 2000.

The thing is, on the one hand, Republicans are begging them to strike it down, and on the other, they have the utter gall, the hypocrisy, to decry activist judges in their very next breath. In fact, judicial activism is one of their very favorite talking points when attacking liberal justices.

Examples of Republican hypocrites whining about judicial activism:

REP. STEVE KING (R-IA):“If we’re going to respect judge-made law and stop praying in our public schools, that was the beginning of the judicial activism that’s begun to break down this civilization, and this culture.”

SEN. JOHN CORNYN (R-TX):“Unelected and serving with lifetime tenure, and substituting their view for the views of the people’s…the people and their elected representatives. That’s not the way our democracy is supposed to work.”

SEN. CHUCK GRASSLEY (R-IA):“Judges are not policymakers. That’s what we are in the Congress of the United States. Judges are called on to decide the facts and to apply the law.”

During a speech at the White House today, President Obama was very clear in what he expected from Congress regarding the subsidies currently enjoyed by highly profitable big oil companies. Not that Congressional Republicans paid any attention. Watch:

Text Transcript of Remarks by the President on Oil and Gas Subsidies March 29, 2012

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. (Applause.) Everybody, please have a seat. Sorry we’re running just a little bit behind, but I figured it’s a great day to enjoy the Rose Garden.

Today, members of Congress have a simple choice to make: They can stand with the big oil companies, or they can stand with the American people.